Political Cortex: Brain Food for the Body Politic

Most would not.

Most people are too insulated in their own bubbles and thoughts to notice much other than their own worries.

"Insulated" pretty much defines far too many Americans these days, while war rages on and the body count rises. For most Americans, the bugle never blows, traffic never stops, no one knocks on their door with the worst possible news, nothing invades their bubbles to remind them of the mayhem perpetrated on their behalf and in their name.

Unless they are members of the military, or their loved ones.....

On military bases across the world, somewhere towards the end of each day, the flag is lowered in a ceremony called retreat. Whether it is simply a recording of a bugle being played over loudspeakers while a small detail lowers the flag, or a bigger hoo-ha event with a marching band, everyone who happens to be outside anywhere on the base is supposed to stop as soon the first note of retreat is played. Each troop then faces the flag or the sound of the bugle, stands at attention and salutes. It lasts around a minute. It is a one-minute moratorium practiced every day by hundreds of thousands of troops around the world.

During my first days in the Air Force I was taught that retreat was not only an opportunity to show our respect for the flag, but to also take a moment out of every single day to remember the sacrifices so many had made so that the rest of us could be alive to share this moment together, part of one of the greatest experiments in human freedom in history. During six weeks of basic training, we purposely went outside every single day for the retreat ceremony, stood together, and saluted.

Later in my career, beyond the rigors of basic training, many of my peers would run inside if they thought it was close to retreat time.

I wouldn't.

I enjoyed and honored that time if I happened to be outside. No matter how stupidly I may have spent my military day, the sound of that bugle reminded me of what it was really all about. Whether I'd been picking up garbage, filing paperwork that no one would ever read, teaching a class I had taught a thousand times before, sifting through intelligence briefings, couriering top secret documents, or driving some politician around the base, everything I did 23 hours and 59 minutes a day was dedicated to that flag, the American people, and those who had served before and given the ultimate sacrifice for our country.

That moratorium, a minute of silence, taking a break from the usual to remember the unusual, is built into every military day.

The word moratorium came up recently at an organizational staff meeting I was attending. Today I'm a peace and social justice activist, just as gung-ho about that as I was about defending my country against all enemies. Actually, I think I'm still doing the same job! The organization's leader asked the assembled group if any of them knew what the word "moratorium" meant. For the younger-than-forty folks, it was more of a struggle. The elders in the room remembered the great moratorium, when people across America and the world stopped whatever they were doing for one day to protest against the war.

The BBC reported the following about the October 15, 1969 Vietnam moratorium:

Americans have taken part in peace initiatives across the United States to protest against the continuing war in Vietnam. The Peace moratorium is believed to have been the largest demonstration in US history with an estimated two million people involved. In towns and cities throughout the US, students, working men and women, school children, the young and the old, took part in religious services, school seminars, street rallies and meetings. Supporters of the moratorium wore black armbands to signify their dissent and paid tribute to American personnel killed in the war since 1961. The focal point was the capital, Washington DC, where more than 40 different activities were planned and about 250,000 demonstrators gathered to make their voices heard.

Members of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) participated in the moratorium planning. Here's a bit about what they remember from the nih.gov web site:

There were significant risks associated with being part of the(planning) committee. The U.S. government under new President Richard Nixon frequently assigned the FBI to investigate -- formally and secretly -- those involved in organizing war protests. VNMC structured its leadership so that a different person was in charge every month, "a reflection not of fear of investigation, but an effort to make leadership as broad as possible."

"What we did is we welcomed and we brought along people who had never been active before," recalled Martin Blumsack. "One of the outstanding things about our committee was the way we treated everyone with respect...I think we were an amazing group for that purpose, as diverse as we were." Blumsack had arrived at NIH in 1968 as a management intern in an administrative research program. He had joined the U.S. Army and served several years before organizing the first anti-war protest held on a military base, a "Vets for Peace" demonstration.

Since before the start of the Iraq war in 2003, I've participated in a countless protests, vigils, teach-ins, prayer services, Congressional meetings, and marches and still the war goes on. In May of 2007, the Democrats capitulated to the Bush administration, giving the president every penny he had asked for, with no strings attached. The Democrats did this despite the overwhelming message from the American people that it was time to pull our troops out of Iraq.

Just yesterday I was at another organizational meeting. This time, an Episcopal priest told us how she had read that a young Iraqi woman had been stoned to death for dating someone who wasn't part of her sect. "I was working on a letter to the congregation about making sure everyone wore name tags on Sundays," she said, "and I realized how crazy it was to be living life as usual when such horrors were happening every single day."

"But what can we do?"

I believe it is time for another moratorium. In September of 2007 the funding for the Iraq war runs dry. The president will have to go, cowboy hat in hand, back to Congress again.

It is time for the American people, those who have the privilege of living in this great land, to stand up and say "enough is enough!"

The questions are where will you be, and will you take even a minute to do something about this ongoing tragedy? Do you believe that you can make a difference?

As Rabbi Michael Lerner of Tikkun and the Network of Spiritual Progressives recently said, "Don't be realistic." You've got to believe that you CAN end this war, no matter how many false-prophets and White House paid pundits tell you it is impossible.

We can all stand at attention, block traffic, salute the flag, do street theater, sing peace songs, stage sit-ins, surround the White House and close down our congressional representative's offices, whatever it takes to put a stop to this war.

Too many people have died for our right to say NO to the war for us to ignore their sacrifice and live even ONE MORE day as though there isn't a bugle playing taps somewhere in the world, another American or Iraqi family grieving, and more blood spilled simply because we didn't have the gumption to scream STOP.

What should you do? Easy!

Watch web sites like micahscall.org, declarationofpeace.org, spiritualprogressives.org, christianpeacewitness.org, sojo.net, politicalcortex.com, Tikkun.org for ideas on what to do and where to be. Make sure you wear your name tags when you show up. An Episcopal priest in Palo Alto will be grateful that you did and the FBI will be too darned busy to collect the millions of names of folks who take part in the biggest retreat ceremony in the history of this nation.

And for all my friends currently serving, when you get your orders to come home, remember to slap them on your barracks door with a gigantic FIGMO emblazoned across the front. For all my veteran friends, help us get FIGMO plastered across Iraq. And for all you civilians who don't know what FIGMO means, look it up! It will give you a good chuckle.

FIGMO - And don't be realistic.

Craig Wiesner is a veteran of the United States Air Force where he served as a Korean Linguist from 1979-1987. He received two Air Force Achievement medals and the Joint Service Achievement medal during his career and was the John Levitow honor graduate from the Air Force Leadership School in 1986. Craig is the co-founder of Reach And Teach, an education company dedicated to peace and social justice. He is on the board of Multifaith Voices for Peace and Justice, an interfaith peace organization based in Palo Alto California. Craig is a frequent contributor to the KQED (National Public Radio) perspective series and has written op-eds for the San Jose Mercury News, the Christian Science Monitor, and CommonDreams.org.